Wednesday, December 9, 2015

Testament of Youth Was Brilliant

I’m a self-proclaimed HUGE fan of period dramas. Being a total history nerd, I love immersing
myself in a well filmed, well-acted, well written historical drama and 2014’s Testament of Youth was just that. Based on Vera Brittain’s memoir of the First
World War; the film stars Alicia Vikander (Anna Karenina, Ex-Machina) as Vera
and Kit Harrington (Game of Thrones) as her fiancée Roland. Focusing less on the battles and violence and
more on the emotional weight of the conflict, the film manages to instill the
fear of the unknown in the viewer as the men and women at home in England wait
with bated breath for news of their loved ones.
Vera’s fiancée, brother, and childhood friends are all sent off to the
front which inspires her to abandon her long sought enrollment at Oxford to
become a nurse with the Voluntary Aid Detachment at the Front. As she spends time waiting for news of her
loved ones Vera helps to heal both allied and German soldiers. This humanizes the conflict and shows how the
Great War was not just a war between countries but a war humanity faced against
itself. Testament of Youth shows how close we came to the brink of
destruction and how despite all the tragedy and suffering endured by those who
were there, we still managed to emerge on the other side with hope for the
future.

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Larissa is the Teen Librarian at the DFL. She has a BA in English Lit from Smith College and an MS in Library and Information Science from Drexel University. She owns a production company with her boyfriend, and together they create film and print works. Larissa is a little obsessed with feminism, the moon, and pizza.